Texas GOP official admits he's a white nationalist

A Texas GOP official recently declared himself a white nationalist on Facebook.

A Texas GOP official recently declared himself a white nationalist on Facebook.

Photo: Ray Myers

Photo: Ray Myers

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A Texas GOP official recently declared himself a white nationalist on Facebook.

A Texas GOP official recently declared himself a white nationalist on Facebook.

Photo: Ray Myers

Texas GOP official admits he's a white nationalist

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A Texas Republican responsible for helping craft the party's state platform recently declared himself a white nationalist.

In a Facebook post originally discovered by the Texas Observer, Texas GOP Platform Committee Member Ray Myers wrote, "I'm a WHITE NATIONALIST and very Proud of it."

Myers' declaration was a response to commentary by CNN's Jim Acosta last week critical of Donald Trump.

White nationalism is a resurgent extremist ideology that believes the government should preserve America for the white race.

It's unclear whether Myers realizes the difference between white nationalism, associated with individuals like David Duke and Richard Spencer, and nationalism, something Trump recently pledged his support to. Nonetheless, Myers' explanation to the Texas Observer as to why he made the comments make it clear white identity is why he supports the movement.

"We're just patriotic Americans, just like anybody else," Myers told the magazine. "I'm a tea party guy and I've got brown and black and American Indians in our tea parties."

"... just like Black Lives Matter, white lives matter, too," Myers said. "We're all in the same melting pot. Now why can't we say, as Anglos, that we're proud?"

According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, a non-profit organization that studies hate groups, white nationalists seek policy goals like ending both legal and illegal non-white immigration, as well as ending multiculturalism.

"These racist aspirations are most commonly articulated as the desire to form a white ethnostate — a calculated idiom favored by white nationalists in order to obscure the inherent violence of such a radical project," reads an SPLC explainer on white nationalism. "Appeals for the white ethnostate are often disingenuously couched in proclamations of love for members of their own race, rather than hatred for others."

Myers is a permanent platform committee member for the Texas GOP. His input helps shape legislative priorities and core values for the Republican Party of Texas.